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Kahu Kordell Kekoa, left; Dr. Elna Masuda, vascular surgeon Straub Benioff; Dr. Todd Miller, Straub Benioff’s chief of staff; Marc Benioff, CEO of Salesforce; Ray Vara, president and CEO of Hawaii Pacific Health; Lynne Benioff; and Dr. John Mickey, Straub Benioff internal medicine physician, attended Thursday’s ceremony.
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Above, Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff gives an interview before the groundbreaking ceremony for Straub Benioff Medical Center on Thursday.
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Participants raised their hands upward during the blessing of the event.
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Heavy rain fell Thursday morning during the inauguration ceremony of the new Straub
Benioff Medical Center on South King Street.
That was considered a blessing by state and health care officials who attended the ceremony, which took place under a large tent at the construction site, which is to become a new 1,600 parking lot places.
With the untying of a maile lei, they celebrated the beginning of the multi-year year
t and recognized philanthropists Marc and Lynne Benioff for their $100 million donation.
“Today is a new beginning for health care in Hawaii,” Benioff said. “We come together here as partners, as one community, and that’s the spirit that has always drawn me to Hawaii. It’s our aloha spirit in action.”
When he first set foot in Hawaii 50 years ago, he said, it was the aloha spirit he fell in love with, along with the people and the idea of ohana . He and his wife Lynne have lived on the island of Hawaii for many years, where they raised their family.
The donation is considered the largest gift to Hawaii Pacific Health, which manages Straub, and, along with the $50 million gift to Hilo Benioff Medical Center, it is considered one of the largest.
of the biggest single in Hawaiian history.
Benioff, CEO of Salesforce, a San Francisco-based software company, recognized and thanked the healthcare workers in the tent, including emergency medical technicians, doctors, nurses and others who are online every day.
During the horrors of the Aug. 8 wildfires in Maui, Straub’s burn unit, the only one in the state, was ready to take immediate action.
he noted. It received nine patients, the largest number of burn victims following a single event in its history.
“We witnessed this during the horrors of the Maui wildfires last year,” he said. “It has touched us all deeply, and we have all seen the extraordinary work of so many of you here in the audience.”
In a groundbreaking ceremony, Hilo Benioff Medical Center also honored the Benioffs last month for their gift, which will help fund the expansion of its intensive care unit, as well as other improvements.
During this ceremony, Benioff shared his memory of how his friend and cultural advisor Daniel Akaka Jr. suffered a stroke in 2023 during a health summit. He remembers the many phone calls and the stress of a seven-hour wait in the emergency room, knowing Akaka had to go to Oahu.
What was needed back then was an ambulance
a helicopter to transport him to a neurology intensive care unit on Oahu, but none were yet available, part of the challenges of health care on the neighbor islands.
Thanks to a partnership with the Sayre Foundation, the Benioffs have since
donated funds to purchase new fire trucks, a rescue boat and two state-of-the-art medical helicopters.
“We had a lot of eyes-
opening experiences, “
Benioff told the Honolulu Star-Advertiser. “That’s why it’s so important for us to invest in the health of Hawaii residents and leverage all of our resources.”
Benioff said a key initiative of his donations was connecting the Hilo Medical Center
to HPH and UCSF Health, which will work more closely together to provide specialized care in Hawaii
the patients.
More than 500 patients travel from Hawaii to California each year for specialized care. UCSF worked with HPH to coordinate the care of these patients and
now extend this reach to Hilo Medical Center.
Shelby Decosta, president of the UCSF Health Care Network, will oversee this collaboration.
She was born in Waimanalo and remembers the day her mother was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. Her mother received most of her primary care at Straub, but traveled to UCSF twice a year for specialized care now available in Hawaii.
Since 2005, the Benioffs have pledged more than $289 million to UCSF, including $200 million to support the Benioff Children’s Association.
San Francisco and Oakland hospitals.
“We have created an incredible partnership between great institutions,” Benioff said.
The Straub redevelopment project was a
A 20-year effort, according to Ray Vara, president and CEO of Hawaii Pacific Health.
Benioff and Vara have been friends for a long time, but it was Benioff who suggested one morning over breakfast that they help with the project.
“I am deeply, deeply grateful for this gift,” Vara said. “I am even more excited about what this gift will do to accelerate the work we are doing collectively to change the way Hawaii looks today and into the future.”
Benioff said philanthropy has always been important to him, personally as well as his business. It integrates the concept of ohana into the Salesforce philosophy.
Public health is a top priority for his philanthropy, along with public education, public parks and the health of the ocean.
He also supported
the Papahanaumokuakea Marine Debris Project, a nonprofit organization that brings dive teams to the northwest islands to remove tens of thousands of pounds of marine debris each year.
Benioff also said he wants to help Maui recover from the wildfires, which he said will take years. He recently donated $1 million to the West Maui Improvement Foundation to help build a new fire station in Olawalu.
Gov. Josh Green called the groundbreaking ceremony at Straub a “sacred cow” moment.
“From the entire state, this is absolutely, absolutely true: You will save thousands and thousands of lives with this donation,” he told the Benioffs. “We will never forget him. We will honor him appropriately, but our hearts go out to you for doing this for the people of Hawaii.”
The parking lot is part of the first phase of Straub’s redevelopment into a “healthcare campus of the future.” Once completed, the new campus is expected to be almost three times larger than the current one.
